Customer Reviews

Living with Books

5 star:		(0)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(3)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

This is more of a coffe table book. It's full of interesting photographs of, what else, books. The pictures show books incorporated into interesting architecture, unique shelving and storage for books, home libraries and offices, etc. The text offers advice and commentary on displaying and storing books in practical, unique, and interesting ways. If you're a bookworm and/or collect lots of books, you would enjoy paging through Living With Books.

I have a feeling the previous reviewers were expecting a how-to book of home construction projects. Actually this is more of a tour guide. It's fascinating to discover the many creative, ingenious, and very original ways architects and ordinary booklovers have found to store books, display them, and enjoy being in their presence. Face it -- one never has enough bookshelves. And some of these homes are definitely masquerading as libraries! Here are bookshelves up under the eaves of an older house, or installed over the doorways in the hall, or built into closets and cupboards and under kitchen counters. Others are freestanding on metal shelves and poles and rigged like a ship's masts. There are small libraries built into the landings of staircases and others that cover entire walls of bedrooms. Some are two tiers deep, with the front one moving sideways on rollers. Others share space with lamps, TV sets, telephones, clocks, computers, ancient artifacts, photographs, and knick-knacks. And the one thing all the arrangements depicted in this book have in common is, none of them -- even the most attractively arranged -- are just for show. One look at the worn covers and frayed jackets tells you these books are the constant companions of their owners.

As a lover and avid collector of books, I had high hopes for this book -- at first glance it seemed entrancing, especially the topic. Unfortunately, once I started reading it more carefully, my spirits sank. Some of the pictures are visually interesting, but most are not. Even more disappointing, there is not much substantive information either. If you like the idea of this book and are looking for a more satisfying read, check out At Home With Books : How Booklovers Live With and Care for Their Libraries by Estelle Ellis(Editor), et al. That book is worth every penny, and you'll enjoy it.

If you want to see suggestions for how to live with large quantities of books, buy "At Home With Books". If you have some money left over after that, buy this book. There are lots of pictures, mostly not very inspiring, or very useful to a person who owns a lot of books. On the other hand, three or four of the photos were very inspiring.

Still, "At Home With Books" had a lot more to offer in the way of inspiration and ideas. I'm not sorry I bought this book, but I would be if my book-buying budget were even slightly more restricted than it is.

some interesting library and book shelf layouts but i feel the author didn't go as far as could and should have. i subscribe to many home periodicals and have seen so much more in those than with this one book devoted entirely to physical book display. good book but at price definately top retail.

I had high hopes because I love reading about books, but this one was disappointing. I originally gave it three stars for the photos, which are worth looking at, but the text it pretty awful -- a serious drawback in a book aimed at compulsive book collectors. I took off one whole star specifically for a line that says something like, "It doesn't matter if books access is difficult, as long as it isn't completely impossible." Doesn't matter to whom? It does to this reader. I reread. I browse nostalgic favorites. I like to handle my books, and I need to be able to get to them. Also, a substantial number of the storage systems shown appear to be concerned more sith style thyan with storage -- I didn't mind the coffee table constructed of books layered with glass, as those were old design catalogs and the whole was sort of a pun, but the grid system and a few other types of shelves that only contained a book or two here and there as placed by a decorator is really not my idea of living with books. Get this if you want pretty pictures. If you're really interested in books themselves and how they are stored, try Henry Petroski's The Book and the Bookshelf instead.